Constant HD access; noise

Silencing hard drives, optical drives and other storage devices

Moderators: NeilBlanchard, Ralf Hutter, sthayashi, Lawrence Lee

Post Reply
Steerpike
Posts: 128
Joined: Sun Aug 11, 2002 3:26 pm
Location: Walnut Creek, CA

Constant HD access; noise

Post by Steerpike » Mon Sep 02, 2002 5:51 pm

I just installed a new HD which has a much quiter base rotation noise, with slightly higher access noise. I figured that was a decent trade-off. I decided to build the OS from scratch, rather than copy the image from the old HD.

Now, with only Windows 2000 SP2 and a few base programs (no antivirus yet, no office products, etc) installed, I can hear the drive acess about every 30-60 seconds or so. I watch task monitor and there's no particular program activity (and without office, there's no findfast, etc; and without anti-virus, there's no constant interference).

I recall from YEARS ago solving this with help from the usenet newsgroups. Possibly some registry key to alter. I just can't for the life of me remember it! I'm almost positive it's a windows thing.

Any ideas, anyone?

Steerpike
Posts: 128
Joined: Sun Aug 11, 2002 3:26 pm
Location: Walnut Creek, CA

Post by Steerpike » Wed Sep 04, 2002 9:55 pm

I remember now the offending program was a RAS server program, and the constant access was caused by having a modem turned off - which does not apply today.

I used 'filemon' (great utility) to see what files were being accessed, but unfortunately, no major pattern - lots of files accessed almost all the time, and no way to stop them ...

So I'm probably going to give up on this hard drive as clearly the access noise is too high.

Gxcad
Patron of SPCR
Posts: 429
Joined: Sun Aug 11, 2002 3:26 pm
Location: San Francisco, CA
Contact:

Post by Gxcad » Sun Sep 08, 2002 12:26 am

out of curiosity, which harddrive is it? Some harddrives access noises can be reduced or even made to the point of inaudibility, one such case is the IBM harddrives.

-Ken

Steerpike
Posts: 128
Joined: Sun Aug 11, 2002 3:26 pm
Location: Walnut Creek, CA

Post by Steerpike » Thu Sep 12, 2002 6:24 pm

To answer your question, I have to come clean and admit my theory about quiet laptop drives is shot to pieces with this ... I took what I thought was a very quiet laptop drive (a hitachi DK23DA-20F), bought an adapter, and used it in my quiet desktop as a test. Sure enough the base noise is quiet, but the access noise is high.

Currently, it's just sitting on a bed of foam in the bottom of the case. Sandwiching it/suspending it may help but it's also running at the same temp (according to Dtemp) as my seagate baraccuda (high 30s, low 40s), and sandwiching it will only make it hotter.

I'm wondering if laptop drives are designed to 'park' their heads after every access, to minimize damage when the laptop is moved - this may account for what seems like a lot of noise associated with not a whole lot of activity. The noise I'm noticing is a very 'tinny' 'kerplunk' approx. every 30 seconds or so, which I'm guessing is associated with either a flush of some cache, or some regular program update (running filemon revealed a massive amount of disk activity, and the noise I'm hearing is not synchronising with these accesses - hence the 'cache' theory).

bluehat
Posts: 84
Joined: Thu Sep 19, 2002 3:47 am

Re: Constant HD access; noise

Post by bluehat » Thu Sep 19, 2002 3:57 am

cschofie wrote:Any ideas, anyone?
I have been using about 6 months some plastic bags filled with sand to absorb all sounds from my maxtor hd, and aluminum plates to conduct the heat away (just lots and lots of sand, and there won't be any resonances). Great for a 0 dB(A) file server!

MikeC
Site Admin
Posts: 12285
Joined: Sun Aug 11, 2002 3:26 pm
Location: Vancouver, BC, Canada
Contact:

Post by MikeC » Thu Sep 19, 2002 7:21 am

Hey bluehat, I want to see some pics of this sandbag noise dampener! If you don't have a place to post the photos, send them to me and I'll toss them up here. I think you might have something there!

In another era, Wharfedale, an English speaker system maker, probably now long dead?, used cabinets made of panels that were sand-filled to try and deaden the box from resonating. I guess you could call it laminating, but what they did was to make a hollow panel, pour clean sand in the cavity, then seal the cavity.

Nothing new under the sun... But I am still interested in seeing photos!

Gxcad
Patron of SPCR
Posts: 429
Joined: Sun Aug 11, 2002 3:26 pm
Location: San Francisco, CA
Contact:

Post by Gxcad » Fri Sep 20, 2002 12:44 am

I am also extremely interested in this solution!

-Ken

bluehat
Posts: 84
Joined: Thu Sep 19, 2002 3:47 am

Post by bluehat » Fri Sep 20, 2002 5:20 am

Ok, here's some quick pictures of this aluminum + sand system (I'll try to make better pages probably later...)

http://members.fortunecity.com/bluehat1/

MikeC
Site Admin
Posts: 12285
Joined: Sun Aug 11, 2002 3:26 pm
Location: Vancouver, BC, Canada
Contact:

Post by MikeC » Fri Sep 20, 2002 7:29 am

That's quite something, bluehat! I bet it does silence the drive -- heck, you've practically buried it, it ought to be silent! :lol:

Not exactly a solution that's practical for everyone, though. Most people do want their drive in the case & they may have a hard time justifying 20Kg bags of sand in their room.

Gxcad
Patron of SPCR
Posts: 429
Joined: Sun Aug 11, 2002 3:26 pm
Location: San Francisco, CA
Contact:

Post by Gxcad » Sat Sep 21, 2002 12:35 pm

Thats quite neat there bluehat, definately a great solution for those willing. Thanks for the pic!!

-Ken

Post Reply